


what they call hard feelings

by orphan_account



Category: Pundit & Broadcast Journalist RPF (US), Real News RPF, Real Person Fiction
Genre: Angst, Bittersweet Ending, F/M, Past Relationship(s), Post-Break Up, Reflections on Love, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-04
Updated: 2017-07-04
Packaged: 2018-11-23 13:36:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11403501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: what is the end of a love story?





	what they call hard feelings

What is the start of a love story? When can you say a love began? Is it when you first meet, years ago, on an unassuming day in an unassuming moment; or is it when you first fall in love, with the beauty in their eyes and the kindness in their laughter and the soft sweet moments you share?

In hindsight, it’s easy to see the start. A better question is, what is the end of a love story? When you say I love you? When you say you do? Or, when you realize, you don’t, not anymore?

When does it end? When do you say it’s over? When is it real, that it’s over?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

She wakes up in the middle of the night, as with most nights, to the trill of a news alert. Her phone is in her hands within seconds and she squints into the brightness of the screen. It takes her a couple of moments to read through the article and she thinks, oh, this isn’t something I’m going to need to report on.

And then she gets a text from Wolf saying she’s going to have to come in first thing in the morning because yes, this is real news and yes, she has to report on it because fuck you that’s why.

“I can’t fucking believe this,” she mumbles, quietly.

(“I believe it,” he’d say, and then he’d press a kiss to her shoulder and mumble into her skin. “Let’s just stay in this time. The world will keep turning. Someone else can cover our shifts.”

She’d chuckle and run her hand down her arm and reply, “They need us.”

And then he’d look up at her with those soft eyes of his and say, “I need you.”

And she’d stay.)

Except, the space beside her in this king-sized bed is empty and there are no late-night early-morning kisses to share, and she pushes the blankets off her body as she swings her legs over the edge and sits up straight.

The cool light of streetlamps filters in through the blinds, quiet and unassuming, keeping in with the night atmosphere. Sunrise is probably coming soon, she knows, and she tiptoes into Jonah’s room to make sure he’s still sleeping.

She’ll have to leave in a couple of hours. Go to work, go report on the news, go on with her life. She steps into the room and gently kisses his head while he’s still asleep. (He’s still so young and that’s probably why he looks so much like his father and the thought stops her every time and)

She closes the door behind her and steps into the kitchen. Breakfast for one, as always.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He cherishes the moments he gets to spend with Jonah. It’s not as though she’s keeping him for herself or anything like that, keeping her son away from his father, but it does have to do with her.

Because, Jonah is their child. Theirs. Half of him and half of her to create something completely new, something that’s never been seen before. Yes, he has his children and yes, he loves them dearly, but Jonah is the youngest. Barely three years old and already, his life will never be the same.

Well, no, that’s not true. Maybe it’s better for him this way, not to know how his parents once were together and now they are not. Not to have that taken away from him, not to know of the long mornings and slow nights and everything in between that his parents once shared.

Ignorance is bliss. He won’t know what he lost. Unlike his father.

But, then again, better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all, right? Maybe Tennyson did know something about heartache. Or, maybe, he was just a bitter old soul. He doesn’t know – she was the one who’d always been better at poetry, between the two of them. He’d just get lost in the words until they just became variations of her image.

Jonah is in bed and she is at the studio and he is in his home and he doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do now.

Moments like these, all he can do is think about her. Wonder what she’s doing, what she’s thinking. He didn’t used to have to wonder. He could always just call her, just message her. Send her tiny little messages and thoughts and feelings.

Thinking of you. Hope you’re okay. I love you.

Sometimes she’d reply, sometimes she couldn’t. But she’d always smile whenever she next saw him and say, “I got your message. I love you too.” And she’d tip her head up and he’d tip his head down and they’d meet in the middle.

He’d always pull away smiling.

In his bedroom, he hears Jonah cry out, and he gets to his feet. Let him be a better father than he was a husband, a lover. Please, let him just have that small mercy. He’s lost everything else.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The worst moments are the ones where she forgets. Even if it’s just for a split second, just a fraction of a heartbeat of a moment, it hurts like fucking hell when she remembers.

It happens in the oddest of moments. She’ll be out in the store and she’ll grab an apple and she’ll open her mouth to say, “Hey, what do you think about these?”

(“I love them,” he’d say, and then he’d grab it and he’d take a bite out of it and she’d roll her eyes and they’d laugh and he’d lean over to kiss her and)

and she’ll close her mouth because she’ll remember that he’s not here and that there’s no one here but her and she shouldn’t be talking to herself. She’ll set the apple back and she’ll move on physically and try to move in every other sense.

It happens sometimes at home when she’s making breakfast or lunch or dinner. She’ll grab a couple of extra ingredients, things she doesn’t like but he does, and she’ll think about what to make

(And then he’d say, “You know I’ll eat anything, right?”, and she’d say, “You really should have more of a preference. One of these days I’ll make something and you’ll say you hate it and then I’ll remind you of this.”

He’d laugh that laugh of his and he’d wrap his arms around her waist and press his head into the crook of her neck and whisper in her ear, “We could always order out.”

“You always order out,” she’d say, no venom in her voice, leaning back into his touch, and he’d turn her around and lift her up onto a counter, hand sliding up her thigh as she pulls him forward and)

and she’d put the ingredients away and grab a takeout menu because fuck, that’s so much easier and she can just sit in front of the TV and watch some kid’s show on Netflix with Jonah without thinking about anything.

It happens around him, too. There’s one special report they’re getting ready for and everyone’s sitting around at a table, typing on laptops and scrolling through phones and shuffling through papers, trying to piece together the pieces of whatever the fuck is happening.

Jeffery is grumbling to himself and Gloria looks like she’d bite off the head of someone if they tried to tear her away from her phone and.

and he’s there too, and he has his brow scrunched in that cute way he always does and it takes her a couple of moments to realize she’s staring but even then, the thought doesn’t matter. His lips are slightly parted and he licks his fingers before he turns the page and she just. watches.

She gets up and heads over to get some coffee. The pot is almost empty and she busies herself in refilling it. She’s one of the few people who actually bothers to make more coffee instead of just complaining about it and going to Starbucks.

Her hands move on their own accord and she’s keeping her brain focused on the issue at hand and she doesn’t register that she’s making two cups because it just feels so natural to make two cups. In fact, she only figures out what she’s done when she’s setting the cup in front of him.

“Here,” she says, and the words are out of her mouth and she blinks.

He looks down at the cup and then back at her and his expression is blank because he’s a journalist, he knows how to do that, except she knows him and she sees it, plain as day, his shock and surprise and

and she sits down and gets right back into her computer, scrolling through an email from one of her sources as she takes a sip of her own coffee. She can feel Jeffery and Gloria staring at her but she pays them no mind.

Not until Gloria clears her throat. “Uh…”

She looks up at her, slight smile playing on her lips. “What, I only have two hands. I couldn’t bring coffee for everyone.”

They share a small laugh, all of them, even him, and under the table, their legs brush, just a little, his clothed pants against her bare shin and it.

it doesn’t feel like the end of the world.

It doesn’t feel like anything at all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

At first, he tries to avoid her. Because the wound is still too fresh. Because if he even thinks about her, his heart aches and his lungs stop and the air is sucked out of the room and he doesn’t think he can even move.

It hurts so much. Every breath he takes without her, every heartbeat they don’t share, every second he exists without her by his side, in any sense. It leaves him in an undying agony, one he can’t even explain. His heart is heavy in his chest and his love for her is suffocating.

He’s read poetry now. There is, definitely, something to be said about how it can completely encapsulate his emotions, the depths of his feelings, the intensity of it all. Maybe that’s the problem. Maybe it just got too much for her.

When they run into each other in the hallways, he is the one who turns the corner and walks the other way. She barely looks at him as he passes, eyes on her phone or on a file or just focused right ahead of her.

She’s so determined, so strong-willed, so full of passion for her work. And yes, he does watch her, in the tiny TV of his office, whenever she is on. He holds a drink in his hands and closes her eyes and lets her words wash over him, crashing waves against the subconscious of his mind.

It doesn’t always work, because she sounds so different on camera than she does when it’s just them – when it was just them, because it isn’t just them anymore – but it’s the closest he can get to his fix of her.

He knows this is a bit of an obsession but when you planned on devoting your entire life to someone, to caring for them and loving them no matter what, then this is just a fulfillment of that promise.

“You know she’ll be on your show, right?” Wolf says to him, one day. “And you’ll have to keep doing reports with her, even though… you know…”

“I know,” he replies. He does know. He might not be prepared but he has to do this anyway. This is his job. It’s all he has left. He needs to do this.

The first time he sees her, taking her seat, lights shining down and giving her face that newscaster glow, his mouth goes dry. She’s listening to someone, chuckling a little, eyes light and sparkling. There’s a strand of hair that falls out and lands right before her eyes and his hand is starting to move, to brush it away, to just touch her, he just wants to…

She brushes it out of her eyes and he finally works up the nerve to look away. He has to read the news, he has to do his job. And the first time she speaks to him, even though it’s in this context – no, because it’s in this context – his brain stops and it just hurts.

He could once talk to her about anything. About nothing. About the moon and the sun and the stars. About Washington and New York and London and whatever, wherever, it didn’t matter. The sky was the limit.

Conversation always flowed so easily between them and she was always amazing to talk to. She knew a little bit about everything and if she didn’t, she would look it up and then become an expert on it and then educate him all about it.

She did it one time during dinner, reading out an article about something – he can’t remember what now – and he couldn’t help but laugh. She looked up at him and raised her brow. “What?”

He shook his head, slowly, still smiling. “Nothing,” he said, and then reached out to take her hand and kiss her palm. “I just… I love you so much.”

She chuckled softly and squeezed his hand and lifted herself from her chair a little to reach over and they kissed. “I love you too.”

That wasn’t the first time they’d said it, nor was it the last – and oh, don’t make him think about the last, he might not be able to recover from that thought – but it’s just one of those moments where, after it’s all said and done, is one of those moments where he realized that this was the woman he wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

And now he won’t.

And, irony upon ironies, he sees her wearing the same dress one day. The same one she wore that day. He knows she probably doesn’t know the significance of that dress – it wasn’t a fancy dress and it wasn’t a fancy night – and yet…

And yet, he sees her and all the breath escapes from his lungs and his heart is heavy in his chest and oh, oh, oh, he is so far gone for her. He is drowning in his love for her. It might literally kill him.

It just might kill him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

She sees him at a Christmas party. Well, _the_ Christmas party. It’s the only one she’s going to this year, and not by choice, but because she is being nice. After all, Jake Tapper is the network’s newest acquisition – sorry, _correspondent_ , and so she had to show up, along with the rest of the politics team.

He’s nice, though. She thinks she’s going to get along just fine with him.

“It’s going to be great working with you,” Jake smiles.

She’s just about to reply when, out of the blue, Jim shows up right beside her, glass of wine in his hand and charming smile on his face. “Hey Jake,” he says, “you and your wife have a great sense of décor. I mean, most people would think four stories is so much but you guys made it great.”

There’s a slight pink flush on Jake’s face as he returns the smile. “You, uh, really think so?”

“I do,” Jim grins. He wraps an arm around Jake and starts talking to him about interior design and she has to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing because she thinks she’s witness to the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

And then her eyes wander around the room and, like a moth drawn to a flame, she finds him. He’s leaning against a doorframe and there’s a glass in his hands and somehow.

somehow, she finds herself walking over.

His eyes widen noticeably when he sees her and his mouth hangs open for a good second before he manages to speak. “Hi,” he says, quietly.

“Hi,” she replies, quietly.

“You…” he takes a short sip and shifts his glass from hand to hand. “You look beautiful.”

There’s not much she can say to that so she says, “I know.” And, after all this time, it’s so strange to see him like this, even though there was once a time when this was how she saw him so often

(so light and happy and drinking and his arms around her and a smile on his face and his fingers tilting her head as he leans down and)

but now they don’t see each other like this. Maybe even at all.

Their eyes meet. The party is still going on around them but the sounds slowly fade away until all she can hear is her own breathing. They take their steps in tandem and then, then they’re slowly walking for the backdoor.

She finishes her wine and sets it on the counter and he holds open the door for her. And he presses a hand to her back as they step out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It takes a second, maybe a few, of just the two of them staring at each other in the outside. The sounds of the party are muffled now, maybe out of a haze, more likely through the glass windows. Light streams from them too and it illuminates her and she looks so, so beautiful. She always has.

He thinks she’s going to stop him when he starts leaning forward, when his hand moves and touches her cheek – and oh, does an electric something go down his spine and rock him to his core, oh, how much did he miss this – and her eyes close before his and then –

They fit in like pieces of a puzzle, worn and frayed but familiar. He tastes her lipstick and feels it smear all over his tongue and teeth and her mouth breathes into his and her hand cards through the hair on the back of his head and he feels like he’s losing himself, all over again, all into her.

His hand moves down her side, slow, gentle; all he wanted was to touch her again, to feel her once more, and now he is like a dying man given the purest wine to drink, at the moment of his demise. Her skin is so soft, as it always is, and he’s hiking up her dress and he knows he should stop but he can’t, he really can’t.

He would if she tells him to but that might be the blow that breaks him.

She doesn’t, though. She tilts her head and lets him kiss down the side of her neck, feathery breaths and the lightest of touches, and she lets out a sigh when his hand starts to pull down her underwear. She’s gripping the back of his jacket, bunching it up and wrinkling it, as she reaches down to unzip his trousers.

There’s an illicit thrill to this, knowing that at any moment, someone might find them. Someone might come through that door he has her pressed up against and see them and they might say something to someone and then, that’s it, their lives are over.

Her dress is up at her hips and she spreads her legs, fingers digging into his back as he fingers her cunt, sliding in and out, letting her drip into his hands until he thinks it’s enough and then it’s a quick couple of fumbles where he pulls down his pants while she kisses down his collar and then he’s pressing into her and,

oh, oh, would it be cliché to say it feels like home? So familiar, something he’s done countless times without any regret, with someone he’s given his heart, his entire being to. He sucks on her earlobe and she nips at the side of his jaw and they breathe out at the same time and he tilts his head so he can kiss her again.

Her head dips forward, then back, sweat on her brow and hair sticking to the side of her face, and she looks divine in the moonlight as she comes. He kisses her again when he does, moaning into her, taking her in, spilling into her, and then –

And then it’s.

over.

He still has her pinned against the wall and she still has her arms wrapped around her shoulders and, in the afterglow, he thinks he can fool himself into thinking they’re still in love. He licks his lips and presses their foreheads together and takes a deep breath.

“Dana,” he whispers, “you deserve all the happiness in the world.”

“You do, too, John,” she says, and pauses, and they kiss again.

It’s the last time, he knows it, and it feels like an eternity and a second all at once. He wonders if she’s sorry it’s over.

He wonders if she’s sorry at all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When she sees him in the hallways now, he doesn’t run away anymore. He smiles politely and she smiles back and, once or twice, they even share a laugh. Everyone is comfortable with it. Gloria even deigns it reasonable to make a joke about their past – it’s fleeting and she fears the worst when she does – but then he laughs and then she and then they all join in.

For once, everything feels. nice.

When she tells him she’s dating again, he takes it well. He just smiles and says, “That’s good. I hope he makes you happy,” and he looks like he means it.

There are nights, when she wakes up and expects to see him again, when she’s in the kitchen and makes a meal for two, when she reaches out to give a kiss to a man who isn’t there, but she knows, with time, it’ll be.

better. easier. all right.

She will get better.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After she tells him she’s dating again, he realizes something.

Love stories don’t end. Not really.

They just fade, into a distance, into fond and familiar memory, one that you bring out in the middle of the night when all your nightmares and dreams come to life and you don’t have anyone else to share them with.

He will always love her, he knows that. And he knows, now, for certain, that she doesn’t feel the same way anymore. She’s moved on. He’s happy for her, he really is.

But he will always love her. And that’s okay. He’s made peace with that. Poetry and prose and news will keep him company in his mournful love, and he will do his best to move on.

He will get better. He will.

(and maybe, one day, they’ll be together again)

**Author's Note:**

> god i am emotional


End file.
